Westminster approves $2.5 million for Main St. senior center

Thursday

Jan 31, 2013 at 6:00 AM

By Paula J. Owen TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF

After decades of struggling in a 1,000-square-foot room inside the American Legion, the town’s seniors, who make up nearly a quarter of the population, will have a new 7,400-square-foot place to call home.

Voters approved $2.5 million in funding for a new senior center, 403-179, in a special election Tuesday after years of proponents working to move the project forward.

The 20-year Proposition 2-1/2 debt exclusion will pay for the construction of a center on 13 acres on West Main Street bought by the town for $350,000 several years ago.

James Moriarty III, a lawyer serving on the Westminster Senior Center Building Committee, said it was time the town provided an adequate space for its seniors.

“It is a shame and a disservice to all the senior citizens who have lived in this town for decades and decades that they really don’t have a sufficient place to go to,” Mr. Moriarty said.

He said the town has spent millions on a new town hall, all the schools are in “top-notch shape” and there is a really nice public safety complex, but the seniors have very little.

“All the seniors have is a decrepit hall at the American Legion and that is where they go,” Mr. Moriarty said. “It is not a place you can really socialize. Compared to all the other buildings in town that have really been built up over the last couple of years, the American Legion is really an eyesore.”

The committee has dealt with setbacks the past five years, he said, including the economic downturn and the priority on funding the library and Crocker Pond.

He said committee members were cautiously optimistic before the election, especially with quarterly taxes being due Friday.

The design — completed by architect My-Ron Hatchett of Reinhardt Associates in Springfield — for the new center includes nurses’ and director’s offices, game and art rooms, a library, a large activity room and a kitchen large enough for caterers if the space is rented out for weddings and other private functions.

Students from the Montachusett Regional Vocational Technical School in Fitchburg will complete some of the work, saving the town about 10 to 15 percent of project costs, he said. Construction is slated to begin in the spring, and students from Monty Tech will start working on the project in September.

It is to be completed in 2015.

Mr. Moriarty said the town is also lacking affordable senior housing. He is hoping that once the center is built it will line the town up for grants to build three 24-unit complexes for seniors on the same site.

There is only one private facility — Wellington Apartments on Meetinghouse Road — for senior housing, he said, yet there is a great need in town.